"I don't know a soul in Denver."

Her sister paused for a moment, thinking deeply. "What is to-day, Edith?" she suddenly inquired--"The twentieth?"

"Yes, I believe so. Why?"

"Then Emerson Hall got to Denver last night. He wrote me from St. Louis that he was going there this week, and would arrive the night of the nineteenth. He expects to be there several weeks. I might ask him."

"Will you?" Mrs. Rogers looked at her eagerly. "I must find out somehow.

It seems terrible, not to write to him, now that he is so sick. I--I care a lot for him, Alice, even if I have decided not to run away with him. Do you think Mr. Hall will do it for you?"

"Who, Emerson? Of course he will. He'd do anything for me. And, besides, I think he knows Billy slightly. They're both Columbia men, you know."

"Send him a wire. Ask him to go to the hospital at once and find out how Billy is. I've got to know."

"All right," said Alice, as she made her way to the desk. "Got a blank?"

"I think there are some here." Edith accompanied her sister to the desk.

"Here's one." She handed Alice the blank.

"What shall I say?" asked Alice, as she seated herself at the desk.

"Just ask him to go to the City Hospital and inquire for William West.

I'll get the elevator boy to take it." She stepped out into the hall and pressed the electric b.u.t.ton. "How much is it for ten words--do you know?" she asked as she re-entered the room.

"Haven't the least idea," said her sister as she handed her the message she had written.

Edith glanced at it, took a dollar bill from her purse, and gave it and the message to the elevator boy who had answered her ring. "You'll probably get the answer in the morning, Alice." She turned to her sister as she closed the door. "You'll bring it right down to me, won't you?"

"Of course."

"And not a word to Donald--that goes without saying. I wouldn't have him know for anything."

"All right. Billy is probably all right by this time, anyhow. As soon as you know that he is, I advise you to sit down and write him a nice, sensible letter--tell him you have reconsidered, and all that. You certainly owe it to him."

"I will, Alice. I ought to have done it long ago. There's the bell," she added, wearily. "It's probably mother."

CHAPTER IX

It was on a cold raw morning, that William West arrived in Denver, and, as he made his way slowly from the sleeper to the waiting 'bus, he shivered under his heavy overcoat. He was not glad to be back. Denver and all its a.s.sociations had faded into the pale background of past memories--his face was set toward the future, a future that promised all that joy of living, of loving and of being loved in return, which he so eagerly desired.

It cut him bitterly to think of his treachery to Donald, a treachery in no way lessened by the fact that love was its motive, yet he argued to his conscience that the future happiness of both Edith and himself was at stake and demanded of him even the sacrifice of his friendship.

He did not go to his accustomed rooms at the _Prairie_, for he intended to make his stay in the city as short and uneventful as possible. There was but one purpose in his mind--to dispose of his holdings in the mine, resign his office as vice-president of the company and invest his entire fortune in safe and desirable bonds, upon the interest of which he would be able to carry out his future plans with no greater attention to business affairs than that involved in clipping off his quarterly or half-yearly coupons. Therefore he held aloof from his old friends, his former a.s.sociations. If he should let the men at the club know of his presence in the city, they would not only take up a great deal of his time, but would inevitably inquire into his plans in a way that might easily prove embarra.s.sing. He therefore betook himself to a quiet hotel, not usually patronized by the traveling public, and, after a smoking-hot breakfast, proceeded to the offices of the company.

West had antic.i.p.ated that his a.s.sociates in the Lone Star Mining Company would be the most probable purchasers of his holdings and for this reason had determined to offer them the first opportunity to buy. His interview with Atkinson, the president, was entirely satisfactory. While expressing deep regret at West's desire to withdraw from active partic.i.p.ation in the business, the astute Boston man grasped at once the opportunity to acquire at, or near, par, a block of stock which would be worth double its present value in the course of a few years. He at once closed with West's offer, taking an option on his holdings for ten days, during which time he expected to arrange for the necessary capital to carry out the purchase. A meeting of the board was called to act upon West's resignation, and, when the latter left the office for luncheon, he had, as far as was possible, for the moment, completed the business that had brought him to Denver.

The following ten days were a nightmare. There was nothing to do, but write to Edith, it seemed, and to read her daily letters over and over, drawing from them new inspiration for his plans with each rereading.

Slowly the ten days pa.s.sed. Atkinson reported entire success in his plans for the syndicate he was forming to take over West's holdings; within a week the latter expected to be flying eastward, leaving the matter of reinvesting his money until he should reach New York.

His anxiety to return as quickly as possible was accentuated by traces of a change of heart which he fancied he detected in some of Edith's later letters. She had spoken of her fears for the success of their plans--her duty to her husband, her boy. "Poor little girl," thought West, "she needs me with her, to keep up her courage in these most trying hours of her life."

The night of the ninth day he went to bed early, with a dull, insistent pain in his right side which he attributed to a cold, a result of the raw, unseasonable weather. In the morning the pain had increased; he had pa.s.sed a restless, broken night, and arose feeling dizzy and half-sick.

He determined to consult a doctor, but not until he had completed his business.

At ten o'clock he met Atkinson and his a.s.sociates, and within an hour the stock had been delivered, and the certified check for close to half a million dollars deposited in the bank. A great sense of relief filled his mind--he was free, to seek happiness wherever in the broad expanse of the world he might find it. Yet beneath all his joy--his exultation, there throbbed a double sense of pain, the dull gnawing of conscience at his heart, and the sharp, insistent throbbing that, knife-like, shot through his right side. Clearly this latter was not a matter to be trifled with. He turned into the first doctor's office that met his eye, and joined the other unfortunates waiting in the anteroom.

The doctor would see him presently, the low-voiced maid informed him. He sat bolt upright in an uncomfortable chair and gripped his hands together fiercely as the sharp pangs of pain tore at his vitals. Would these people never be through? he wondered. From within the doctor's office, shut off by gla.s.s doors, came the faint echoes of conversation; some unfortunate, no doubt, hearing the dread sentence of life or death, or perhaps only a nervous woman, being prescribed bread pills for a fancied indisposition. There were two men and a woman waiting ahead of him. They looked healthy enough; he wondered what they could have the matter with them that made their faces so grave.

For nearly an hour he was forced to wait in an agony of mind and body, until his turn came, and his thoughts were the thoughts of a man upon whom the hand of death has already laid its icy touch. He knew it was all nonsense--engendered of pain-racked nerves, yet his conscience smote him, and would not be stilled. The pain in his side spelled disaster, and he could not shake off the thought. He had never believed in the direct intervention of Providence in the affairs of mankind, yet here was he, at the moment when all his future, as he had planned it, lay smiling before him, stricken with an illness which, laugh at it as he would, he could not help fearing might mean an end to all his hopes.

He sat up and shook his head with a quick, nervous motion which had been characteristic of him since childhood. This was all the height of folly, he argued--the natural train of gloomy thoughts which resulted from his surroundings. Even the faint odor of carbolic acid, compounded with that of other unknown chemicals, was enough to make a man feel blue. He rose as the maid beckoned to him--the other consultations had happily been short.

Dr. Oliver was a man of few words. He had not time for more, for his practice was one of the largest in the city. He glanced at West's pain-drawn face, listened to his few words of explanation, felt his side with practiced hands, and delivered his opinion in a few terse words.

"Appendicitis," he said quickly, "and an aggravated case. You must undergo an operation at once."

Somehow or other West felt a sudden sense of relief at these words.

After all, an operation for appendicitis was not such a serious matter.

He knew any number of people who had been through it. "I am stopping at a hotel," he observed. "I do not live in Denver. I suppose I shall be obliged to go to a hospital at once."

"By all means." The doctor turned to his desk telephone and called a number. "I will arrange for an operation at the City Hospital, if you wish it."

"Thank you," replied West, "I do wish it."

The doctor held a short conversation over the telephone. "I presume you can go to the hospital at once?" he inquired.

West nodded.

"I will send for a carriage," the doctor went on, as he drew a thermometer from a leather case and placed it beneath West's tongue.

"Your case is an acute one, Mr. West, and we cannot afford to lose any time." He again spoke sharply over the telephone, then, bidding West bare his arm, gave him a quick hypodermic injection which diffused a blessed sense of relief through every nerve of his pain-racked body. He sank upon a couch, and awaited the coming of the carriage. His thoughts were no longer gloomy. He seemed to be floating in a sea of warmth, which caressed him pleasurably and filled him with a delicious feeling of well-being. Even the dull-figured flowers on the walls of the doctor's office seemed alive, and glowing with color. The coming of the carriage seemed unimportant; nothing, in fact, seemed to matter, now that the gnawing of that terrible pain had left him.

It was Wednesday afternoon when West arrived at the City Hospital, and within two hours thereafter the operation was over, and he slowly returned to a sense of the reality of life, with a feeling of deadly nausea, and the pain once more throbbing in his right side. Over him bent a clear-eyed nurse, sympathetic as to his comfort, offering him a gla.s.s of water. Presently a physician joined her. West looked at them without interest and from the jumbled impressions of the day once more pa.s.sed into a dreamless sleep.

It was in the early morning that he first began to think of Edith. Her letters would be awaiting him at his hotel. He must send for them--he must write to her and tell her of all that had happened. He felt that she would be alarmed at not hearing from him, for, until the day before, he had not failed to post a letter to her each night, telling her of the events of the day.

In response to his repeated requests, the nurse sent a messenger boy for his mail, and, when the latter returned, she read him Edith's letter at his request. He could not read it himself--he lay flat on his back, in semi-darkness, and even the slight effort of moving his hands seemed to send innumerable sharp quivers of pain through every portion of his body.

The nurse read the letter haltingly, as one reads an unfamiliar handwriting; it was signed, like all the letters, with initials only, and told him of Edith's anxiety to see him, of her hopes and fears, and all the other foolish things that women write to men they love. To him it seemed a message from heaven, for he loved her very deeply, and her slightest word became a treasure to him, invested with a new significance; lifted from its commonplace surroundings; something to ponder over, and think about all through the long, weary day. He sent a reply, treating lightly of his illness, so as not to alarm her needlessly. The nurse carefully wrote it down for him at his dictation.

He hesitated when it came to telling the woman the address--he did not wish to compromise Edith, to give her name to a stranger. There was no other way, however, and, after all, he believed that, within a month at the outside, they would be standing hand in hand at the taffrail of some great ocean liner, watching the towering skyline of New York as it disappeared in the hazy distance along with their troubles and cares.

The mere fact that their secret was known, now, to a hospital nurse, could do no harm; in a few weeks all the world would know it, but they would be in each other's arms, and the opinion of the world would not matter very much.

The day seemed strangely long and he was glad when night came, and with it some respite from his pain. He felt tired, terribly tired, and his head throbbed with a burning fever. They gave him things to make him sleep, and water for his cracking lips. As the evening wore on even the thoughts of the morning's letter no longer interested him. He turned his face to the wall, and tried not to think of anything at all. After a while he slept, while the nurse and the doctor on his evening round spoke together softly, and in grave tones, with many anxious glances in his direction.

The next morning his fever was better, and the letter brought him from his hotel made the day seem for a time full of joy and brightness, but after a little while a great sense of weariness overcame him. Nothing seemed to matter much; whether he lived or died. He was conscious only of a desire to sleep--how long, even though forever, he did not care in the very least.

About noon he was roused by the approach of someone toward his bed, and opened his eyes to see Doctor Oliver standing beside him. The doctor looked very grave as he took his patient's hand, his fingers mechanically feeling the rapid, weak pulse. "Mr. West," said the doctor, "I think you should let your family know of your illness."